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AN ADDRESS 



DELIVERED BY 



NICHOLAS BIDDLE, LL.D 



AT PRINCETON, ST. J. 

SEPTEMBER 30, 1835. 



i 



I 



AN ADDRESS, 



DELIVERED 



BEFORE THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION 



NASSAU-HALL, 



ON THE DAY OF THE 



ANNUAL COMMENCEMENT 



OF THE COLLEGE, 



SEPTEMBER 30, 1835, 



BY NICHOLAS BIDDLE, LL. D. 



PUBLISHED BY REQUEST OF THE ASSOCIATION. 



PRINCETON : 

PRINTED BY ROBERT E. HORNOR. 

1835. 



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\1 






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Princeton, September 30lh, 1835, 
N. Biddle, Esq. 

Sir, — We are instructed by the Alumni Association of Nassau Hall to 
present to you their thanks for the very impressive and eloquent Address 
which you delivered before them this day, and to request from you a copy 
for publication. We feel great pleasure in communicating to you this expres- 
sion of their gratification, and would indulge the hope that you will add to 
their obligations by a compliance with their request. 
With great respect, 

JARED D. FYLER, J 

JOHN MACLEAN, C Committee. 

ALBERT B. DOD, \ 



Philadelphia, Oct. 22d, 1835. 
Gentlemen, — 

I send in compliance with your request a copy of the address. The 
only regret which accompanies it is, that I had not leisure to make it shorter 
and worthier. 

With great respect, 

Yours, 

N. BIDDLE. 
Messrs J. D. Fyler, ) 

John Maclean, > Committee. 
Albert B. Dod, ) 



ADDRESS 



Mr. President, and Gentlemen, 
Alumni of Nassau-Hall — 

We have come, my friends, to revisit together the scene of 
our early studies. Since last we parted here, time and distance 
have widely separated us : — the world and the world's cares 
have engrossed us ; — death with no sparing hand has been 
amongst us, — but we have at length returned, probably for 
the last time, to mingle our remembrances of the living and 
our regrets over the departed. At such an hour what can I 
say to you which your own hearts have not anticipated? 
We stand here — on this narrow strait which separates the 
long past from the brief futurity which awaits us — a feeble 
group, the wreck of so many argosies that spread their young 
and venturous sails on the wide ocean of life, freighted with 
light hearts, too early overclouded — and buoyant hopes too 
soon quenched beneath its waves. How often as the storms 
of life assailed them, would they gladly have turned for 
shelter to this quiet haven which they left so impatiently, as 
the prisoned eagle, who chafes his breast against the bars, 
which keep him from the green fields and the gay flowers of 
spring, would, as the clouds of winter gather round him, take 
refuge in the solitary nest which his young hopes deserted. 

It is our more fortunate lot to come back at last to that 
seclusion ; — our early years are recalled by the presence of 
scenes endeared by a crowd of gentle associations, — we seem 



to bathe our hearts in the clear and cool fountains of our 
boyhood, whose calm bosom has never yet been dimmed by 
the tears of sorrow, nor clouded by the hand of misfortune. 
But in thus communing, the thoughts that rise unbidden, are 
full of salutary sadness. How to live and how to die — to live 
without wrong and to die without fear, is the great lesson of 
our moral nature, without which all learning is fruitless and 
all knowledge unavailing — and if that lesson be best taught 
by displaying the transitory and uncertain character of all the 
world can give or take away ; with what intensity are these 
convictions inspired here, where the memory alone is the 
great teacher and our personal experience rises to the dignity 
of wisdom. For myself, the most solemn impressions of my 
life are stamped by the scene before us. It has been my lot 
to be not an unmoved observer of many scenes and persons 
whose fate best illustrates the nothingness of human existence ; 
but none have ever sunk upon my heart with a deeper feeling 
than this return to the intellectual home of our boyhood. 

I do remember in my youth to have lived at Delphos, per- 
haps the noblest monument of the ancient world — the awful 
mother of wide spread religions — deemed to share with the 
Divinity its knowledge of the future — the mistress of human 
destiny, whom nations propitiated with their offerings — en- 
riched by accumulated arts and treasures to which antiquity 
had no parallel. What is Delphos now? Its magnificent 
temples lie in ruins — the inscriptions which record its glory 
are defaced — its oracles are dumb ; the suppliant crowd that 
brought up the votive offerings of nations is dispersed, and 
amidst the fragments of that religion which overshadowed the 
world, under a miserable shed, is raised the feeble chant of a 






christian hymn, itself half suppressed lest it might offend some 
barbarian soldier of Mahomet. A few fragments of marble, 
the shapeless relics of a wall — some prostrate columns, are all 
that represent the buried glories of Sparta, of Corinth, or 
Argos ; while of Leuctra and Mantinea and Choeronea — 
names that for ages have stirred up heroic passions in human 
bosoms, just enough remains to attest their existence. These 
are melancholy pictures of the decay of nations. 

I do remember too, to have stood by the great master-spirit 
of our age on the day when he was crowned Emperor. There 
was that day gathered round him all that could fill the ambi- 
tion or gratify the heart of a human being. Conqueror in so 
many fields, while his glory was yet unstained, all the trophies 
that war can give were at his feet. He had used them nobly, 
for he brought peace and prosperity to his country, which 
now seemed in its gratitude, to bestow upon him, not merely 
its honors, but that fatal gift, its freedom. He was surrounded 
by kinsmen to whom he gave thrones — by warriors who had 
followed him through so many battles to this his last triumph, 
— by all Europe that seemed to contribute or consent, to his 
elevation. And then the outward magnificence — the decora- 
tions — the pomps — all shed the enchantment of the senses 
over that great spectacle. It seemed as if fortune had gathered 
all her gifts merely to scatter them — as, if in scorn of human 
destiny, of all this splendor, the great object should be the first 
victim. A few short years and I strove to reassemble this 
pageant. Vain ! That venerable pontiff, the chief of the 
Catholic religion, who had come from Rome to bestow on 
him the crown of Charlemagne, was now despoiled of his own 
kingdom and imprisoned by him. — that wife, the sharer of his 



8 

humbler fortunes, and this day the partner of his throne, 
was divorced by him, and her place rilled by a stranger — 
his kinsmen were all dethroned and banished or executed— 
the soldiers who had sworn allegiance, betrayed and deserted 
him — and he, the loftiest and proudest of them all, twice de- 
throned, twice exiled, perished alone in a wretched island, six 
thousand miles from the scene of his dominion and his glory. 
That is the great moral lesson of our age. 

Yet these examples of the decay of nations and the uncertain 
fate of those who govern them, have a weaker hold on our 
sympathy than those changes which affect our own personal 
existence. It is now thirty-four years since the voice you 
now hear, sounded for the last time within these walls. Thir- 
ty-four years ! nearly half the period allotted to man's most 
prolonged existence. A whole generation of men has passed 
away. The infancy of that day has ripened into manhood — 
the mature life of that day has sunk into decrepitude — its old 
age has long since gone. We come back here unremembered 
and unknown ; new forms meet our eyes, — voices no longer 
familiar salute us; — we ask for those we knew and are an- 
swered by their descendants. From this living solitude, we 
take refuge in our recollections, and strive to people the 
present with the past. We recall the anniversaries which 
marked our own entrance into the world — our companions 
radiant with their own young happiness at leaping over the 
barrier of their seclusion, and the gay crowd that thronged to 
share their pleasures. There was the father, who came to 
witness the honors of his son, the promise only, as he fondly 
deemed, of the greater distinctions that awaited him, — there 
was the mother, who wept with an anxious joy at the triumph 



of that child whom she had nursed in her own bosom — there 
was the sister whose young heart swelled at the applause which 
followed her own dear playmate. The father, the mother, and 
the sisters are all gone. We walk through these halls, and 
pronounce the name of our companions. It was once echoed 
back by some shout of youthful merriment. But no answer 
comes now. We look into the chambers, round every one of 
which some fond association dwells. The beds are there just 
as they were wont to be, but they who once leaped from them 
to greet us, lie in lowlier beds, where we shall soon join them, 
and from which there is but one, the final, waking. These 
are the things that bring home to us our own absolute nothing- 
ness. They make us pause and ponder on that which in the 
tumult of life is too often forgotten — that which, though no 
human eye has seen, is worth all that human eye has ever 
seen, the deep, and dark, and unfathomed mystery of the 
human soul. They make us look inward, too, for self-exami- 
nation, and if that scrutiny may suggest many things which 
might have been better done, or more wisely left undone, we 
may rejoice in being spared to repair them. But if these 
thoughts are mournful, they bring with them at least one 
consoling assurance. These changes, this decay, are only in 
ourselves — they have not touched our country. One genera- 
tion has passed away, another has succeeded — but nature is 
ever the same bounteous mother. The fields are as green, 
the harvests as abundant — and our country, blest with a thou- 
sand advantages — blessed above all with free institutions, has 
outstripped even the wildest dreams our imagination had 
pictured for her. Our own institution has had its full share 
in the general advancement. We see it with increased and 

2 



10 

increasing resources — with an enlarged and distinguished body 
of Professors — a more numerous train of students — with all 
the evidences of great and growing prosperity. 

But we must not sadden, with personal themes like these, 
the parting hour of our young friends, who are about to do as 
we once did, — with joyous spirits exchange their seclusion for 
the active duties of the world. At such a moment, the expe- 
rience of those who have gone before them, may not be wholly 
useless — and I will venture, therefore, to address to them a few 
words not inappropriate now, and which may not perhaps be 
altogether forgotten hereafter. 

You have this day finished your education — you must now 
begin your studies. This education will have been unavailing, 
if it has not taught that although much is done, much remains 
to be done. The taste for letters is yours, the capacity to 
acquire knowledge is yours,— and your minds, prepared by 
discipline and instruction, have received the seeds of all useful 
learning. But the harvest they may yield depends wholly on 
yourselves. If these rich possessions be neglected, they will 
run to waste and destruction, leaving you the melancholy ex- 
amples of an abortive effort at improvement. But care and 
cultivation will add largely to your present acquirements, and 
conduct you to any honors or distinctions to which you may 
aspire. To this you are often exhorted by those preceptors 
whose own success is the best testimony of the value of their 
instructions — but I cannot do you a greater service than by 
adding my own experience to their assurance, that liberal 
studies will be the safest guides and the truest friends in every 
condition, private or public, to which you may be destined. 

You come on the stage of life at a peculiar period. Fox 



11 

more than half a century the world has been shaken by a 
great struggle between new ideas and old institutions. The 
mass of mankind have outgrown the restraints of their in- 
fancy, and are striving to adapt their governments to their 
opinions, while the great problem on the part of existing au- 
thorities, is how to yield gracefully, and seem to concede 
what may else be extorted. Whatever may be the result, the 
contest itself has developed an intense, and sometimes a dis- 
tempered, energy in the passions of men — and forced a wider 
diffusion of knowledge — a more universal education — a more 
alert and excited feeling among all conditions. Such a 
community requires in its leaders a corresponding power of 
intellect. They will not submit their rights, or liberties, or 
complicated interests to incompetent hands — and although 
sometimes misled by passion, their purpose is to give power to 
those only who have capacity to employ it usefully aud safely. 
From you, therefore, destined as you naturally are to be pro- 
minent in your native communities, more is expected — more 
will be exacted — and your only hope of distinction is, to be in 
advance of those whom you aspire to lead. You must go on, 
or you must go down ; and you can go on only by diligent 
perseverance in your studies, so as to withstand the heated 
competition around you. They are more valuable now, from 
their power to counteract the influence of mere physical wants, 
which is the tendency of our age. The wonders of mechanical 
improvement have so surprised the world, and so multiplied its 
physical pleasures, that we sometimes incline to exaggerate 
their value. The personal comforts which they furnish, have 
tended to unspiritualize the understanding, and make us prone 
to disparage more intellectual pursuits, which yield no such 



12 

luxurious enjoyments. But so long as the heart and the 
imagination most influence human actions — so long as mind 
predominates over matter— that is, while our race endures, the 
nature of man — his passions, his history, and his destiny will 
ever be the noblest study of a human being. In every walk of 
life you will find their advantages. You can engage in no pur- 
suit where they will not ensure a superiority over less instructed 
competitors. In those deemed exclusively mechanical, they 
excite to experiment, they suggest improvements, they render 
labor more intelligent, and, therefore, more productive. Even 
the most monotonous routine of mechanical life leaves many 
hours to the dominion of solitary reflection, which early in- 
struction might kindle into usefulness. They are more neces- 
sary in our country, because labor has attached to it here 
two peculiarities, almost unknown elsewhere — power and 
leisure — political power, which education can alone render 
valuable — and leisure, the natural result of the general pros- 
perity — but the most dangerous gift to an uncultivated mind. 

There are some who fear that these studies may inspire a 
distaste for industry', and that the fields and workshops may 
be abandoned, because they who work can also read. But 
men need not hate labor because they love study — nor look 
above their profession, because they can look beyond it. The 
industry of any community may be safely trusted to the actual 
wants which make it necessary, and the spirit of accumulation 
which makes it afterwards agreeable — and the only effect will 
be, not to make men work less, but to make that work more 
skilful. Pass through the other occupations of life, and culti- 
vation maintains its ascendancy. Men are commonly more 
intelligent in their affairs, generally more successful, always 



13 

more respected, for habits of taste and literary cultivation. As 
yoa ascend in the scale of life, their efficacy is still more 
striking. In the sacred calling, among those who are equal 
in the essentials of Christian virtue, how much more of honor 
and of usefulness is the portion of that scholar whose learning 
enables him to trace back to its source the stream of revelation, 
separating from its pure waters the turbid infusion which the 
imperfection of human language, or the misguided zeal of 
fanatics may have mingled with it. In the healing art, what 
resources for alleviating human suffering and prolonging the 
existence of those we love, may be employed by him who 
renders every age and every climate tributary to his improve- 
ment. In the kindred profession of the law, which embraces 
the whole circle of human affairs, the highest honors are re- 
served, not for him who is content with the ordinary routine 
of litigation, but for the riper scholar who seeks in every 
science — in all liberal arts, and throughout the whole domain 
of letters, whatever may adorn or dignify his noble occupation. 
But it is on the wider field of usefulness, for which every 
American should be prepared, that these studies are of the 
highest value. You are all destined for public life. Many of 
you will, I trust, be conspicuous there. I deem it right, then, 
earnestly to impress on you the influence of liberal studies on 
public duties, by explaining my own conviction, that inatten- 
tion to them is a prevailing defect among us — that one of the 
greatest dangers to our institutions arises from the want of 
them — and that, without them, no public man can ever acquire 
extended usefulness or durable fame. 

In our country, too many young men rush into the arena 
of public life without adequate preparation. They go abroad 



14 

because their home is cheerless. They fill their minds with 
the vulgar excitement of what they call politics, for the want 
of more genial stimulants within. Unable to sustain the 
rivalry of more disciplined intellects, they soon retire in dis- 
gust and mortification, or what is far worse, persevere after 
distinctions which they can now obtain only by artifice. 
They accordingly take refuge in leagues and factions— they 
rejoice in stratagems — they glory in combinations, — weapons 
all these, by which mediocrity revenges itself on the imcal dila- 
ting manliness of genius — and mines its way to power. Their 
knowledge of themselves inspires a low estimate of others. 
They distrust the judgment and the intelligence of the com- 
munity, on whose passions alone they rely for advancement — 
and their only study is to watch the shifting currents of popu- 
lar prejudice, and be ready at a moment's warning to follow 
*hem. For this purpose, their theory is, to have no principles 
and to give no opinions, never to do any thing so marked 
as to be inconsistent with doing the direct reverse — and 
never to srv any thing not capable of contradictory expla- 
nations. They are thus disencumbered for the race — and 
as the ancient mathematician could have moved the world 
if he had had a place to stand on, they are sure of success 
if they have only room to turn. Accordingly, they worship 
cunning, which is only the counterfeit of wisdom, and 
deem themselves sagacious only because they are selfish. 
They believe that all generous sentiments of love of country, 
for which they feel no sympathy in their own breasts, are 
hollow pretences in others — that public life is a game in 
which success depends on dexterity — and that all government 
is a mere struggle for place. They thus disarm ambition of 



15 

its only fascination, the desire of authority in order to benefit 
the country; since they do not seek places to obtain power, 
but power to obtain places. Such persons may rise to great 
official stations — for high offices are like the tops of the pyra- 
mids, which reptiles can reach as well as eagles. But though 
they may gain places, they never can gain honors — they may 
be politicians — they never can become statesmen. The mys- 
tery of their success lies in their adroit management of our 
own weakness — just as the credulity of his audience makes 
half the juggler's skill. Personally and singly, objects of 
indifference, our collected merits are devoutly adored when 
we acquire the name of " the people." Our sovereignty, our 
virtues, our talents, are the daily themes of eulogy : they 
assure us that we are the best and wisest of the human race — 
that their highest glory is to be the instruments of our plea- 
sure, and that they will never act nor think nor speak but as 
we direct them. If we name them to executive stations, they 
promise to execute only what we desire — if we send them to 
deliberative bodies, they engage never to deliberate, but be 
guided solely by the light of our intuitive wisdom. Startled 
at first by language, which, when addressed to other sove- 
reigns, we are accustomed to ridicule for its abject sycophancy, 
constant repetition makes it less incredible. By degrees, 
although we may not believe all the praise, we cannot doubt 
the praiser, till at last we become so spoiled by adulation, that 
truth is unwelcome. If it comes from a stranger, it must be 
prejudice — if from a native, scarce less than treason ; and 
when some unhappy traveller ventures to smile at follies 
which we will not see or dare not acknowledge, instead of 
disregarding it. or being amused by it, or profiting by it, we 



IG 

resent it as an indignity to our sovereign perfections. This 
childish sensitiveness would be only ludicrous if it did not 
expose us to the seduction of those who flatter us only till 
they are able to betray us — as men praise what they mean to 
sell— treating us like pagan idols, caresssed till we have 
granted away our power — and then scourged for our impo- 
tence. Their pursuit of place has alienated them from the 
walks of honest industry— their anxiety for the public fortunes 
has dissipated their own. With nothing left either in their 
minds or means to retreat upon ; having no self-esteem, and 
losing that of others, when they cease to possess authority, 
they acquire a servile love of sunshine— a dread of being 
what is called unpopular, that makes them the ready instru- 
ments of any chief who promises to be the strongest. They 
degenerate at last into mere demagogues, wandering about 
the political common, without a principle or a dollar, and 
anxious to dispose to the highest bidder of their only remaining 
possession, their popularity. If successful, they grow giddy 
with the frequent turns by which they rose, and wither into 
obscurity. If they miscalculate — if they fall into that fatal 
error — a minority — retirement, which is synonymous with 
disgrace, awaits them, while their more fortunate rivals, after 
flourishing for a season in a gaudy and feverish notoriety, are 
eclipsed by some fresher demagogue, some more popular man 
of the people. Such is the melancholy history of many per- 
sons, victims of an abortive ambition, whom more cultivation 
might have rendered useful and honorable citizens. 

Above this crowd and beyond them all stands that character 
whicli I trust many of you will become — a real American 
statesman. 



17 

For the high and holy duty of serving his country, he 
begins by deep and solitary studies of its constitution and laws, 
and all its great interests. These studies are extended over 
the whole circumference of knowledge — all the depths and 
shoals of the human passions are sounded to acquire the mas- 
tery over them. The solid structure is then strengthened 
and embellished by familiarity with ancient and modern lan- 
guages — with history, which supplies the treasures of old 
experience — with eloquence, which gives them attraction — 
and with the whole of that wide miscellaneous literature, 
which spreads over them all a perpetual freshness and variety. 
These acquirements are sometimes reproached by the ignorant 
as being pedantry. They would be pedantic if they intruded 
into public affairs inappropriately, but in subordination to the 
settled habits of the individual, they add grace to the strength 
of his general character, as the foliage ornaments the fruit that 
ripens beneath it. They are again denounced as weakening 
the force of native talent, and contrasted disparagingly with 
what are called rough and strong minded men. But rough- 
ness is no necessary attendant on strength; the true steel is not 
weakened by the highest polish — just as the scymetar of Da- 
mascus, more flexible in the hands of its master, inflicts a 
keener wound than the coarsest blade. So far from impair- 
ing the native strength of the mind, at every moment this 
knowledge is available. In the play of human interests and 
passions, the same causes ever influence the same results ; what 
has been, will again be, and there is no contingency of affairs 
on which the history of the past may not shed its warning 
light on the future. The modern languages bring him into 
immediate contact with the living science and the gifted minds 

3 



18 

of his remote cotemporaries. All the forms of literature, which 
are but the varied modifications in which the human intellect 
develops itself, contribute to reveal to him its structure and its 
passions— and these endowments can be displayed in a states- 
man's career only by eloquence— itself a master power, attained 
only by cultivation, and never more requiring it than now, 
when its influence is endangered by its abuse. Our institutions 
require and create a multitude of public speakers and writers — 
but, without culture, their very numbers impede their excel- 
lence —as the wild richness of the soil throws out an nnweeded 
and rank luxuriance. Accordingly, in all that we say or write 
about publie affairs, a crude abundance is the disease of our 
American style. On the commonest topic of business, a speech 
swells into a declamation — an official statement grows to a dis- 
sertation. A discourse about any thing must contain every 
thing. We will take nothing for granted. We must com- 
mence at the very commencement. An ejectment for ten acres, 
reproduces the whole discovery of America— a discussion about 
a tariff or a turnpike, summons from their remotest caves 
the adverse blasts of windy rhetoric — and on those great Ser- 
bonian bogs, known in political geography as constitutional 
questions, our ambitious fluency often begins with the general 
deluge, and ends with its own. It is thus that even the good 
sense and reason of some become wearisome, while the undis- 
ciplined fancy of others wanders into all the extravagances and 
the gaudy phraseology which distinguish our western oriental- 
ism. The result is, that our public affairs are in danger of 
becoming wholly unintelligible — concealed rather than ex- 
plained, as they often are, in long harangues which few who 
can escape will hear, and in massive documents which all 



19 

who see will shun. For this idle waste of words — at once a 
political evil and a social wrong — the only remedy is study. 
The last degree of refinement is simplicity ; the highest elo- 
quence is the plainest; the most effective style is the pure, 
severe and vigorous manner, of which the great masters are 
the best teachers. 

But the endearing charm of letters in a statesman, is the 
calmness and dignity which they diffuse over his whole 
thoughts and character. He feels that there are higher pur- 
suits than the struggles for place. He knows that he has 
other enjoyments. They assist his public duties — they re- 
cruit his exhausted powers, and they fill, with a calm and 
genuine satisfaction, those hours of repose so irksome to the 
mere man of politics. Above all, and what is worth all, they 
make him more thoroughly and perfectly independent. It is 
this spirit of personal independence which is the great safe- 
guard of our institutions. It seems to be the law of our 
physical and of our moral nature, that every thing should 
perish in its own excesses. The peculiar merit of free insti- 
tutions is, that they embody and enforce the public sentiment — 
the abuse which has destroyed them is. that they execute 
prematurely, the crude opinions of masses of men without 
adequate reflection, and before the passions which excited 
them can subside. Opinions now are so easily accumulated 
in masses, and their action is so immediate, that unless their 
first impulses are resisted, they will not brook even the re- 
traints which, in cooler moments, they have imposed on them- 
selves, but break over the barriers of their own laws. Their 
impatience is quickened by the constant adulation from the 
competitors for their favor, till, at last, men become unwilling 



20 

to hazard offence by speaking wholesome truth. It is thus that 
the caprice of a single individual, some wild phantasy, perhaps, 
of some unworthy person, easily corrected, or, if there were 
need, easily subdued at first — when propagated over numerous 
minds, not more intelligent than the first, becomes, at length, 
commanding — and superior intellects are overawed by the im- 
posing presence of a wide-spread folly, as the noxious vapor 
of the lowest marsh, may poison, by contagion, a thousand 
free hills. That is our first danger. The second and far 
greater peril is, when these excited masses are wielded by 
temporary favorites, who lead them against the constitution 
and the laws. For both these dangers, the only security for 
freedom is found in the personal independence of public men. 
This independence is not a mere abundance of fortune, which 
makes place unnecessary — for wealth is no security for per- 
sonal uprightness — but it is the independence of mind, the 
result of talents and education, which makes the possessor 
conscious that he relies on himself alone — that he seeks no 
station by unworthy means — will receive none with humilia- 
tion — will retain none with dishonor. They take their stand 
accordingly. Their true position is that where they can best 
defend the country equally from this inflamed populace and 
their unworthy leaders — on the one hand, resisting this fatal 
weakness — the fear of losing popular favor — and, on the 
other, disdaining all humiliating compliances with men in 
power. 

Of the ancient and modern world, the best model of the 
union of the man of letters and the statesman was he, with 
whose writings your studies have made you familiar — Cicero. 
The most diligent researches, the most various acquirements, 



2t 

prepared him for the active career of public life, which he 
mingled with laborious studies, so as never, for a moment, to 
diminish the vigor of his public character. How often, and 
how well he served his country all history attests. When the 
arts and the arms of Cataline had nearly destroyed the freedom 
of Rome, it was this great man of letters who threw himself 
into the midst of that band of desperate conspirators, and by 
his single intrepidity and eloquence rescued the republic. 

When that more noble and dangerous criminal, Csesar, 
broke down the public liberty, after vainly striving to resist the 
tide of infatuation, Cicero retired to his farm, where he com- 
posed those deep philosophical works which have been the 
admiration of all succeeding time. But they could not avert 
his heart from his country — and on that day — on that very 
hour when the dagger of Casca avenged the freedom of Rome, 
he was in the Senate, and the first words of Brutus on raising 
his bloody steel, were to call on Cicero — the noblest homage, 
this, which patriotism ever paid to letters. 

Let it not diminish your admiration that Cicero was pro- 
scribed and put to death. They who live for their country 
must be prepared to die for it. For the same reason, hatred 
to those who enslaved his country, his great predecessor, De- 
mosthenes, shared a similar fate. But both died in their 
country's service — and their great memories shall endure for 
ever, long after the loftiest structures of the proudest sovereigns. 
There were kings in Egypt who piled up enormous monu- 
ments with the vain hope of immortality. Their follies have 
survived their history. No man can tell who built the pyra- 
mids. But the names of these great martyrs of human liberty 
have been in all succeeding time the trumpet call to freedom. 



22 

toach word which they have spoken is treasured, and has 
served to rally nations against their oppressors. 

Trained by these studies and animated by the habitual con- 
•templation of the examples of those who have gone before you, 
as a true American statesman, you may lay your hand "on your 
country's altar. From that hour — swerved by no sinister pur- 
pose, swayed by no selfish motive — your whole heart must be 
devoted to her happiness and her glory. No country could be 
worthier of a statesman's care. On none has nature lavished 
more of the materials of happiness and of greatness — as fa- 
tal if they are misdirected, as they must be glorious when 
rightly used. On the American statesman, then, devolves the 
solemn charge of sustaining its institutions against temporary 
excesses, either of the people or their rulers — and protecting 
them from their greatest foes — which will always lie in their 
own bosom. You can accomplish this only by persevering in 
your own independence — by doing your duty fearlessly to the 
country. If you fail to please her, do not the less serve her, 
for she is not the less your country. Never flatter the people — 
leave that to those who mean to betray them. Remember that 
the man who gave the most luxurious entertainments to the 
Roman people, was the same who immediately after destroyed 
their freedom. That was Julius Caesar. Remember that the 
most bloody tyrant of our age was the meanest in his courtship 
to the mob, and scarcely ever spoke without invoking for his 
atrocities what he called " the poor people." That man was 
Robespierre. Never let any action of your life be influenced by 
the desire of obtaining popular applause at the expense of your 
own sincere and manly convictions. No favor from any sove- 
reign — a single individual, or thirteen millions, can console 



23 

you for the loss of your own esteem. If they are offended, 
trust to their returning reason to do you justice, and should 
that hope fail, where you. cannot serve with honor, you can 
retire with dignity. You did not seek power — and you can 
readily leave it, since you are qualified for retirement, and 
since you carry into it the proud consolation of having done 
your duty. 

But should you ever be called to act the stern, yet glorious 
part which these patriot statesmen performed, you will not fail 
in the requisite energy. It may be, that, not as of old, another 
robust barbarian from Thrace, like Maximin — not a new gla- 
diator slave, like Spartacus — but some frontier Cataline may 
come up with the insolent ambition to command you and your 
children. More dangerous still, the people may be bartered 
away as other sovereigns have been, by faithless favorites, just 
as the very guards at Rome sold the empire at open auction to 
the highest bidder, Julian. The same arts which succeeded 
of old, may not be unavailing here — a conspiracy of profligate 
men, pandering to the passions of the people, may inflame 
them to their ruin — and the country, betrayed into the hands 
of its worst citizens, may be enslaved with all the appear- 
ances of freedom. Should that day come, remember never 
to capitulate— never to compromise — never to yield to the 
country's enemies. Remember that crime is not the less 
guilty — it is only the more dangerous by success. If you 
should see the cause betrayed by those who ought to defend 
it, be you only the more faithful. Never desert the country — 
never despond over its fortunes. Confront its betrayers, as 
madmen are made to quail beneath the stern gaze of fearless 
reason. They will denounce you. Disregard their outcries — 



24 

it is only the scream of the vultures whom you scare from 
their prey. They will seek to destroy you. Rejoice that your 
country's enemies are yours. You can never fall more wor- 
thily than in defending her from her own degenerate children. 
If overborne by this tumult, and the cause seems hopeless, 
continue self-sustained and self-possessed. Retire to your fields, 
but look beyond them. Nourish your spirits with meditation 
on the mighty dead who have saved their country. From 
your own quiet elevation, watch calmly this servile route as 
its triumph sweeps before you. The avenging hour will at 
last come. It cannot be that our free nation can long endure 
the vulgar dominion of ignorance and profligacy. You will 
live to see the laws re-established — these banditti will be 
scourged back to their caverns — the penitentiary will reclaim 
its fugitives in office, and the only remembrance which history 
will preserve of them, is the energy with which you resisted 
and defeated them. 

My last words then to you, my young friends, are to pursue 
the studies which you have successfully begun. You may 
always confide in them as the ornaments of prosperity — the 
consolation of adverse fortune — your support in public life — 
your refuge in retirement — giving to the private citizen his 
most refined enjoyments, and to the statesman, independence 
and distinction. 



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